Release
by Firefly101
Summary: One-shot about a general infected. It's simple, and I might do a seperate follow-up about the several characters. Please R&R!
1. Chapter 1

Pain and red. The concrete presses up against my face. Even though it's black, I still see blood red. I will my eyes to flicker open, and they do. My head feels empty, and it aches. It aches badly. Using the concrete as a sort of trampoline, I pull myself to my feet and stumble around out into the street. There are others. They're leaning on poles, stumbling, just like me. I slide down next to a pole and hold my head in my hands. I don't know how much more I can take. I don't know how long I sit there, my head in my hands.

One day.

One night.

Two days.

Two nights.

Three days after my arrival, something happens. I'm sitting there, like always, unwilling to move. Two days into my silent vigil, I recognized a insatiable hunger in my stomach, a hole. And it will not go away. It will not go away. Late into the third day, several of the other infected look up. They're tentative, and then they start screaming. Some primal instinct tells me to follow them. I clamber unsteadily into my feet and start to run with the others, blending into a single, primal horde of feverish bodies.

We've run for about a quarter of a mile when I hear it. A wailing siren that causes my headache to blossom into new realms of pain. Something tells me that in order to cease this inescapable pain, I have to stop the noise. I have to stop the noise. I have to stop the noise. I can't breathe, my head is going to explode. It's going to explode. And then new color explodes into being. Bright yellow and blue and green, beautiful, non-red colors. They are outlining several forms that seem to be pumping with something. It looks far too wonderful to ignore. I make a beeline for the farthest one, as the others are occupying the first two. I scream at him and he fires wildly, but I barely notice the frenzied bullets whizzing by. There's only the heat coming off of him in waves that can warm up my freezing body. And then I leap onto him, tackling him, my teeth going for his neck and they penetrate.

I'm biting and blood flows, my teeth going through the skin and through the sinew and muscle until it connects with bone. I can't stop what I'm doing as I grapple with him, holding his gurgling form to the asphault. He fights but I can tell he's losing the battle to live. I bite and I tear at his flesh, enjoying the warmth slowly flowing back into my limbs, and my head seems to feel like it's floating, because oh, the pain is gone. The pain and the cold are gone. They're gone. I can barely believe it, but even after they're gone, I continue biting and tearing. I don't know why, but something feels satisfying as I swallow and destroy his corpse, but before long, it's finished. It wasn't long enough. As soon as I lean back from bones and scraps of flesh, the cold and the pain come back.

They come back.

They come back.

I don't want to move from here. I can't, my seemingly frozen limbs won't let me. So I lock into a kneeling position, simply sitting there, waiting. Waiting for the end, for the next warmth and euphoria, and that's it. I sit there for a week, motionless. A statue. And that's when it happens. Cold metal presses into my neck, and I smell it. Him. One of the living. Before I can react, before I can turn around to see his face before he dies, he says quietly, "Your name was Carolina." I start to turn, to lunge, ignoring this foreign statement.

And then there's a bang.

And I'm released.


	2. To All Who Read The First Part

To all those who read and enjoyed my story:

In order to make all you fan fiction readers happy, I'm going to allow all of you to vote. So, here are your options: I can do more one-chapter stories about random infected, and not all of them will die.

OR- I could do a longer story, a back story on Carolina and the man who blew off her head.

Go ahead, rate and review, and vote in those reviews!

-Firefly101


	3. Chapter 2

Note: Alright, everyone. Going to put up one more new general infected one-shot, just for fun. CAUTION: May not be as epic as the first one. CAUTION NUMBER 2: However, this one-shot may still induce puking, nightmares, and other less than savory consequences.

Disclaimer: I do not own Francis, Zoey, Louis, or Bill. Only the unnamed infected main character.

* * *

The first thing that I notice is the cold. It's unbearably cold, practically freezing as I stumble upwards. Something doesn't allow me to stand, as I simply collapse into a slightly deranged, uncomfortable kneeling position. Seconds, minutes, hours tick away as I sit there. Then, finally, I rally myself to crawl to the door. Something tugs at my hands and wrists, though, and I'm dragged backwards with a yelp. For some reason, everything is crimson, as if blood covers the walls and the ceiling and the floor. A black string seems to be connecting me to the wall. I tug at it and it holds firm.

I'm bound to this room.

Four days.

Four days of silence and misery.

Four days of pain and crimson tides.

Early the fifth day, something, sound, comes to me. They're loud. Voices. Three- no, four of them. They approach the barricade binding me from the world. Colors, sky blue, grass green, outline them. The first one- a man, speaks.

"Safe house should be nearby," he says, his voice sounding worn.

"It should be," a quieter voice, who sounds like a girl, agrees, "but we should check this room. Bill won't last much longer without first aid."

A mean voice, almost taunting, joins in. "Grampa Bill, war veteran, needing help? Not likely."

A fourth voice, this one sounding even more tired than the first two, "Francis, do us all a favor."

"What," the mean one says, "do you need your cane, Grandpa?"

All three of the others say, "Shut up, Francis."

"Here, lemme blow open this sucker," says the first voice. There's a bang, and my ears ring in time with my head. I clutch them, whatever things binding me to the wall making only a whisper. The door buckles slightly, but doesn't break.

"Why not open it?" the girl says.

"Zoey, there might be a general infected in there that will spring us. We should blow a hole in the door first, backup, and let it claw at us like there's no tomorrow. Here, use your auto shotgun and help me pump a few rounds into this door."

There's a click, and the bang is doubled. I let out a screech as wood explodes, showering me and the living on the other side of the door. Coughing, followed by lights. The light hurts. It hurts and it stings and it feels like I'm burning, God, I'm burning. I lunge at the light source. I catch a glimpse of leather, tattooed skin, and then I'm dragged backwards by the thin chains.

"Whoa! What the hell? Louis, you could've shot this fucking vampire!" the tattooed man says. I decide he's Francis.

One in a tie, with dark skin, and a shotgun responds. I think he's the one who shot the door first. "Francis, I'm not saving your skin. You didn't save Bill from that Tank, huh? Or that Boomer? OR that Hunter? OR that Smoker at the beginning? And you didn't help me with that horde of infected that ganged up on us!"

The mean one sniggers. I let out a shriek. The colors are so close, within arms' reach. I can taste them on my tongue, and my throat aches, my brain seems to be stuck with one thought- get the blue and the green and the yellow and the purple. It's so close, and if only I could get them. The light shines over my bonds and the one with the tie lets out a gasp. Louis, I realize. His name was Louis.

"Bill… Zoey… Francis… come have a look at this shit," Louis whispers almost reverently. I snap at him as the others approach. I get a full view of all three of them. The girl has a ponytail with a pink jacket, and the old one, who is limping along, is dressed in green with military medals and a submachine gun.

Francis mutters, "What the fuck? Are those… wires?" He moves his gun-mounted light up the wire into the wall.

The girl, Zoey, is the next to respond. "Nails? This guy nailed himself into the wall?" They almost sound respectful. But that isn't the problem. The problem is their lights and their noise…. And their colors that ache and hurt and make me want to feel flesh and blood and skull and bone and- But I need to stop, I need to stop, I need to stop, but I can't.

Francis laughed, "Oh, who the fuck cares? Let's just blast this one and move the hell on."

Zoey and Louis look appalled, but walk onwards, leaving me with Francis. He reaches around and takes out a bottle with a rag stuffed into the top. "Here doggy…. Here doggy, doggy… would you like a treat?" he whispers, pulling out a small stick. With a flash it lights up, and I let out a howl. More light, more heat, God, help me, God, save me, from the light, from the darkness, from life, from everything. He lights the rag and with a laugh tosses it into the room. Then he turns and leaves, his beautiful, eternal colors fading into dreams and memories.

And then there's pain.

Pain and pain and heat and warmth and warmth and pain…

And that's when I hear his last words, before I melt away, into the floor and become one with the building.

"Meet you in hell, asshole."

And somehow, I know that's where we're going to meet.

Somehow, I know how this is going to end. Something comes back. Not my name. Another's. _Patricia, where are you?_

And then I'm one with the flames and the fire, and it's where I belong.


End file.
